Quinn won't back down

Latest News

EDMONTON — The day after he was fined $10,000, Pat Quinn decided to double down and say it again.

This time, he was careful not to rile the politically correct police who had served up the punishment for the revolting crime he committed in the first place.

Quinn has essentially been fined $10,000 for reminiscing.

He'd mostly been fined $10,000 for being colorful.

At the absolute worst, he was been fined $10,000 for having a seniors moment.

This time Quinn said it softly and didn't carry a big hockey stick to hit somebody over the head with it.

But he said exactly the same thing as he said two nights earlier about Calgary's Jarome Iginla taking out Sheldon Souray's skates and sending him face first into the boards with a concussion.

“The whole goal of this thing is that I don't want anybody hurt, whether it's a Flames player or anybody else in a situation like that,” the old school Edmonton Oilers coach began.

“I said what I felt in a heated sort of way and any viewing of it confirms what I saw. It's important that our players – our players, NHL players – don't get injured in spots like that. There's lots of other spots, big hits and other stuff like that. I mean this is a game for men.

“I always try to say what I think. I wasn't trying to incite anything. There's just some stuff that shouldn't be allowed. Ask any player what's one of the most dishonourable things in the game and that's the poke of the feet when you're trying to brace yourself going into the boards with speed.

“I think (Souray) was expecting a check and next thing you know he's defenceless. It was because he was on the weight bearing blade and he had no defence. None.
“It was something I didn't like seeing. It could have been reversed and I still wouldn't have liked seeing it, if it was a Flames player in there. There is supposed to be a code of honour in the game, a little bit, and some guys infringe on it.”

Quinn made the statements at the morning skate prior to Saturday night's game against the Montreal Canadiens. It was his first opportunity to speak to the subject of the fine.

A couple of his players and his associate coach had checked in rather forcefully on the topic moments earlier instead of taking the NHL-approved response of no response at all.

In two words, Steve Staios said it best: “It's stupid,” he said.

Captain Ethan Moreau, who was criticized by Quinn as part of the $10,000 quote, was incredulous as well.

“It seemed a little extreme. It's a pretty sensitive world the world we're living in right now. It's a world where you can't really speak your mind or where you can't read between the lines and know he was upset. You can't take something like that so literally.”

Shoot the messenger. Ignore the message.

Associate coach Tom Renney said Quinn spoke straight the first time.

“He was saying it as it was. People heard 'hit him over the head with a stick' and that's all they heard.”

When Quinn said what he said after the shootout loss to the Calgary Flames, there was no rush out of the room withreporters thinking they had some sort of sensational story with a 'Pat Quinn Wants Hit-Him-Over-The-Head-With-Your-Stick Vigilante Justice To Return To NHL' headline.

We heard what he was saying and it wasn't in any way shape or form that he was endorsing or inciting somebody to hit somebody over the head with his hockey stick.

Quote-unquote:

“If that had happened in the old days he would have got hit over the head with a stick. Right after. That's the way you used to deal with it. Now you can't touch 'em. It was a pretty dirty play in my opinion. He poked his feet out.

Then piled on top of him. Somehow they never deal with that crap and they won't let the vigilante stuff happen to deal with it. It's disappointing.

“In the era I come from you do dirt with dirt,” he added and took Moreau to task for giving Iginla a fight.

“That's not addressing it,” he said. “You don't give him honour. Why would you give a man honour for that type of play? He honoured him with a fist fight.”

The league ruled it “inappropropriate and without justification” and fined Quinn $10,000 and Iginla $0.00.

Which is to say the NHL once again “didn't deal with that crap.”

And the really stupid thing here is that the $10,000 fine brought more attention to what Quinn said than existed when he said it. The NHL sensationalized the story themselves. Colin Campbell should fine himself $10,000.